our december sun is setting
by Phantom Thief Oryx
Summary: In the end, neither of them could escape their father's shadow. — Noatak, Tarrlok


At first, it's men who remind him of his father.

It's not hard to find them in a city like Ba Sing Se, corrupt and filthy beneath a gilded exterior. They lurk in the shadows and the back alleys; smalltime drug dealers and thugs for hire with vulgar minds and vicious eyes. Noatak watches them from afar as they go about their lives. He watches as they carelessly use bending to terrorize and maim, and he wonders… Why them? Why are inherently cruel people given such powers, while good, honest people suffer at their hands?

One night, Noatak finds himself at the end of an empty street, with a man named Daigo on his knees before him.

"No," Daigo whispers, fear etched into his face as his body rebels against him. "Please… Whatever you want, I'll do it! You want money? O-or maybe you want someone taken out? C'mon, man… Please…"

Noatak reaches out and presses his thumb to the man's forehead. He wonders if this is what the Avatar felt like, with Yakone helpless at his feet. Did his father beg for mercy too? Did he wear the same expression that Daigo wears now – one of abject terror and shame? Did he tremble when confronted with Avatar Aang's unrivaled power?

For the first time in a long time, Noatak smiles.

.

.

The two little boys are crying.

"Don't hurt him," the older one pleads, tugging on Noatak's sleeve. "P-please, let him go! He hasn't done anything wrong!"

"Daddy," the younger one whimpers, burying his face in his brother's shirt.

Noatak stares at the children, brow furrowed in confusion. Why do they seem so sad? Why do they beg compassion for such a lowly man as this? His hand hovers over their father's forehead, and he can feel the man's heart fluttering madly, like a caged bird. He is a coward and a drunkard and thief, and this is the punishment he deserves.

"Don't you understand?" Noatak asks, desperation tingeing his voice. "Don't you see? _I'm saving you from him._"

.

.

Months fade into years, and Noatak finds himself growing restless. Is this all he's really meant for? Delivering justice to petty criminals under cover of darkness, forever unrecognized for his deeds? He possesses a power unlike any other, a power far greater than that of the aging Avatar, who at that very moment lies on his deathbed, pathetic and enfeebled. Noatak knows that he deserves more than this humble life.

Soon he begins to hear rumors – bits and pieces of gossip in the marketplace, hushed conversations at the tavern down the street. "Republic City," people whisper. "That's where _they_ are. The anti-bending resistance."

Noatak is intrigued. He imagines what it would be like, to be the leader of the resistance. To belong to something, a cause he can believe in. To have hundreds of loyal followers chanting his name. To show the world his greatness and be acknowledged for once in his life as more than just a tool for someone else's revenge.

A week later, the Avatar dies, and amidst the endless throng of white-clad mourners that crowd the streets, Noatak leaves Ba Sing Se behind and heads west to the city by the bay.

.

.

When he asks around, he's met with anxious expressions.

"The resistance is _underground_," his neighbor hisses, pressing a finger to her lips. "We're not supposed to talk about it!"

"But that doesn't make any sense," Noatak argues. "We'll never have our voices heard if we keep everything secret."

His neighbor glances about warily, like she expects to see someone listening in the shadows. "Whatever they told you in Ba Sing Se, it was probably an exaggeration," she whispers. "The resistance has no staying power at the moment, no unifying element to keep it together. It's barely more than a ragtag group of angry, powerless people. If they went public now, they'd merely be laughed at by the hotshot benders who rule this city. Or worse yet, they'd become a target." Her gaze darkens. "Folks who get in the way of benders' ambitions tend to pay the price tenfold, if you catch my drift."

Noatak scowls. He understands her meaning all too well.

"So what the resistance needs," he muses aloud, "is a rallying point?"

"Basically, yes. But I don't think any among them now has the courage to be that person." The woman sighs, and smiles sadly. "At this rate, we may not live to see equality."

Noatak smiles back at her reassuringly.

"Let's not count ourselves out just yet."

.

.

The crowd is small, no more than a hundred people. The venue, an abandoned warehouse with shattered windows and weeds growing up through the cracked floors, leaves much to be desired. But this, he knows, will change. Everything will change, from here on out – his life and the lives of every single citizen of Republic City.

"My name is Amon," he says, from behind the mask, "and a firebender killed my family."

.

.

When he gets back from inspecting the newest prototype for the electroshock gauntlet, Amon immediately turns on the radio, fiddling with the knobs until he gets to the news station.

He's been following recent events with a great deal of interest. Councilwoman Suyin's sudden passing has caused a massive upset in the inner workings of the city government. A greedy and cold-hearted woman, Suyin had often dominated the Council singlehandedly through the implementation of illicit political alliances and thinly veiled threats. She had had close ties with several big-name businessmen, with whom she was complicit in the total domination of their respective markets.

Now she's dead ("heart attack," the autopsy said, which Amon rather doubts), and the delicate web of corruption she wove has disintegrated into what can only be called chaos.

"Three weeks from now is the official _emergency_ election for the coveted position of Minister of Commerce," the reporter is saying. "On the newly revised ballot we have some familiar faces and some fresh-faced up-and-comers… We'll have an interview with Huan Jing Be later – this is his seventh attempt at the Ministry, folks, and he shows no signs of giving up – and we'll have some words from the lesser-knowns in this race, including Paozhi, Yoru, Tarrlok, and the stunningly beautiful Mei Wakatsu, who really should consider a career change…"

Amon stares at the radio.

_There's no way,_ he thinks. _It's not possible._ And yet there's a pain in his chest that he hasn't felt for many years, and a hopeful spark at the back of his mind, reminding him of a time he's tried his best to forget. (A person he no longer wants to be.)

The next day, Tarrlok is giving a speech at City Hall. Amon tells his Lieutenant that he has pressing business to attend to; the meeting with Hiroshi Sato will have to wait. He sheds his mask and makeup and slips out the back exit, careful to remain unseen.

His brother is almost unrecognizable. That is his first thought. The round-faced, wide-eyed little boy Amon remembers is gone without a trace, and in his place is a handsome, confident man with a sly smile. He is so very different. It almost hurts to see. _What happened to you, Tarrlok, during the years we've been apart? What changed you? Was it father? Or did you change of your volition, forced to stand alone against the world after I abandoned you so cruelly?_

The part of him that is still Noatak wants to run up to him, wants to say, "It's me, brother. I'm here." They could finally have their happy ending then – just the two of them, together at last, helping each other forget the ghosts that haunt them.

But Amon sees what Noatak refuses to: that it's too late for happy endings.

(Perhaps it always has been.)

.

.

He takes Tarrlok's bending in a snow-shrouded cabin deep in the mountains. _I'm sorry, brother,_ he thinks,_ but you've become __**him**__ after all._

Days later, he takes the Avatar's bending in the back of a dark, dingy storeroom, and realizes:

_So have I._

.

.

He can feel Tarrlok reaching out and putting on the gauntlet. He can feel the sadness and the resignation coursing through his brother's veins, the bitterness of a man with nowhere left to turn.

In his last moments, Noatak imagines a different life, one where he protected his brother instead of leaving him alone. One where they left, together with their mother, before Yakone could poison their minds and sink his claws deep into their hearts. They would've settled down in a small coastal village somewhere, so their mother could look out and see the ocean. They would've led peaceful lives, simple and carefree and _happy_, growing up and growing old together, getting married and having families of their own. And they would've forgotten Yakone eventually, for in the end he was just a man, nothing more; a man who could not hide the spitefulness in his soul.

_If we erase ourselves from this world_, Noatak wonders, _these tools of petty revenge that we have become, can we go back and try again?_

The sea stretches out endlessly before them, and Noatak thinks of all the places he's never been. He thinks of all the sights he's never seen and all the emotions he never had a chance to feel.

"It will be just like the good old days," Tarrlok says.

And then there is nothing.


End file.
